


Under the Gun

by Zeke Black (istia)



Series: Los Hermanos [3]
Category: The Magnificent Seven (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, POV Chris Larabee, Sibling Incest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-01-16
Updated: 2009-01-16
Packaged: 2017-10-02 06:14:50
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,595
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/istia/pseuds/Zeke%20Black
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>While Ezra's away from the ranch, Buck has something to say to Chris. A <em>Los Hermanos</em> story, where the Seven are brothers and half-brothers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Under the Gun

###### FOUR CORNERS, WASHINGTON | SPRING 1980

Mad took a flying leap off the porch and raced around the back yard in a choppy, erratic circle. Nose pointed to the dark, cloud-spattered sky, she barked in hoarse, wild spurts keyed to signals only she heard. Chris chuckled and took another swig of his after-dinner beer, setting the porch swing into gentle, creaking motion while he watched the antics of the most aptly named dog in town. It felt like rain in the offing, but the night air was calm enough to hear the hum of insects' wings.

Light spilled across the porch as the door opened. Buck stepped outside, pulling the door shut behind him and letting the screen door spring back with a clatter as he stepped to the front of the porch. The smell of Maxwell House rose with a wisp of steam from his mug to mingle with the vanilla-almond scent of the night phlox clustered in the border beneath the porch. Buck's profile was limned with light from the crescent moon like a silver half-mask. It washed him with an ethereal glamour until he shook his head and chuckled, deep and sultry and familiar, and he was all earthiness again, from his loam-brown hair and faded Levi's to the scuffed cowboy boots that clumped on the boards as he sank down next to Chris in a long-legged sprawl.

"That idiot dog sure the hell lives up to her name. She's never gonna figure out she hasn't a hope in hell of ever actually catching one of those bats she thinks she's so close to getting every night, is she?"

Chris grinned. "Nope."

Buck was a solid warmth against his right side, the smell of clean skin and Ivory soap stamping him like a family watermark; the way Chris himself, he supposed, was marked to other people's senses as a Larabee. They all used the same soap, bought it at the bulk sales along with cartons of Heinz baked beans and Ragu spaghetti sauce. Plain and simple fare, what they'd been used to all their lives, which had turned out to be true even of Vin and JD.

Not Ezra, of course. Nothing about Ezra's life had shaped or marked him like one of them. Even when he was home and used the bar of Ivory in the bathtub like everybody else, he never smelled quite the same. Ezra washed his clothes in their old Maytag and used the big, cheap boxes of Tide they bought, yet he still carried the fragrance of alien places and a life none of them knew, as though it came from his pores, was part of his flesh. An essence he exuded: Of humid nights in the French Quarter, of magnolias and shrimp creole and the damp richness of Mississippi-soaked earth; of dry desert heat and the neon shine of Vegas nights; of salt air penetrating Atlantic City back rooms and of high stakes and knives hidden in smiles. His skin itself, finer and paler than their sun-weathered bodies, tasted of restlessness and constant moves and bags kept packed for quick departures.

Ezra was unique, different, but he was as familiar now to all of Chris's senses as his brothers were. Missing the taste of Ezra was a dull ache in his nerves, compounded of equal parts want and worry. His empty bed cushioned him in the homey scents he'd known all his life, true even when the bed had been Sarah's, too. The strangeness she'd brought with her had disappeared so quickly he couldn't point to the moment she'd become a natural part of the ranch.

But the smell of home was no longer quite right without the differences Ezra brought with him.

"Good day's work today." Buck's voice, warm and prosaic as the ground their lives were built upon, was a murmur of familiarity in the dim light, the steadiest presence Chris had known in his entire life. When the younger ones were gone, lost to other families or, in Nathan's case later on, reclaimed but away from them studying, and Josiah was off wandering the world and learning and pondering, Buck had always been at his side. Buck was the one constant in Chris's lifetime of sudden, sharp changes and immeasurable losses.

He smiled and relaxed so his shoulder pressed Buck's. "Yup. Vin and JD both pull more'n their weight now."

"They took to this life like cocks to dawn." Pride and satisfaction laced Buck's low-voiced chuckle. "Them two just go to show you can take the boys off the ranch, but you can't take the ranch outta the boys."

Chris snorted, but he felt the same pleasure, along with another surge of relief their two youngest had not only come home, but wanted to stay, a relief he and Buck had shared between them before. Satisfaction, too, for the way Vin and JD had both come to think of the ranch as "home," showing the same settled comfortableness here the rest of them felt.

"With Josiah sticking around, we should be able to handle the regular work and the trail rides pretty well." The smell of Buck's coffee drifted to Chris as Buck took a swallow before resting the mug back down on his knee. "Nathan might even be able to help out while he's on his summer break, in between his work at the clinic. We should do okay this year. Got most of the kinks worked out last summer on how to juggle the different jobs."

Chris just nodded, knowing Buck would feel his agreement in the darkness from where their arms touched. He wasn't worried about the ranch or the influx of visitors likely to start arriving soon, wanting to ride the trails he and the others had created last year. The season might be hectic and good if word had spread, or it might be a failure if folks who'd checked it out last year hadn't found anything worth coming back for, or worth telling friends about. But he reckoned at least some of them would be back. A few regulars were already coming for riding lessons. JD and Buck's shared enthusiasm, along with their charm and Buck's patience and skill with greenhorns, made them popular teachers.

Though at least a couple of high school girls seemed to prefer Vin being in charge of their lessons, just a tad to Buck's pique. Chris grinned to himself, turning his head as Mad's helter-skelter run brought her in an ecstatic swing past the porch, her frantic, joyful barking rising and falling in volume like the pulse of the universe.

Buck took another drink of his coffee, then drew in a deep, audible breath and his arm tensed against Chris's. Chris's stomach clenched in wary anticipation.

"Yeah, it's damn good to have the family together."

Chris kept his face turned to the yard, listening to the cadence of Mad's barking as she ranged along the limits of the big fenced garden. The wariness singing warnings down his nerves made him half-inclined to get up, do his own mad run, but the silence lasted only a beat and it was too late.

Buck continued speaking in the same strong, even tone. "All we're missing is Ezra. But he should be home soon. Isn't that what he said?"

Chris didn't try to keep the tightness out of his voice. "You heard him."

"Yeah." The swing creaked as Buck bent to put his mug down onto the porch. "But I figure he probably says more to you than he does to the rest of us." Another beat of silence, then Buck puffed out a breath. His voice was determined, with an edge of something like defensiveness, or perhaps belligerence. "Listen, Chris, I've got something to say and you ain't gonna want to hear it, but I'm saying it anyway."

"Buck, for--"

"I'm saying it anyway, dammit."

And he would, Chris knew; if he gave into the impulse to pull away from Buck right now and go inside, it'd only delay the fucking inevitable because Buck would just corner him some other day. One way or another, Buck would have his say. Chris forced himself to relax back against the swing. From the corner of his eye, he saw Buck raise a hand and comb his fingers through his hair, a familiar nervous gesture.

"All right. I ain't gonna beat around the bush. This thing between you and Ezra--well, you know already I don't get it, neither you wanting to be with a guy after having a beautiful woman like Sarah, and especially not...the other thing. But--" he turned to face Chris, the moonlight glinting on his eyes and along the curve of his cheek "--it doesn't matter. You already know that, too. You want it, for whatever reason, and he appears to want it, and you haven't looked this peaceful for too damned long, so I can't honestly say it's something you should stop."

Buck shifted his eyes down to his lap and Chris gripped the age-smoothed arm of the swing to keep himself from bolting.

Buck's voice was hush-puppy soft. "The rest of us have made our peace with it because something about this thing suits you, and it seems to suit Ezra, so it must be good in its own way." He shrugged. "Whatever way that is.

"But the point is, this ain't only about you, pard. We're all involved in it, in this thing between the two of you, no matter if we'd rather not be. We can't help but be involved seeing as how both of you are our brothers. We aren't gonna do anything that'll lose you, or chase you away, but we don't want to lose Ezra, either."

Chris spoke over him, hoping to make him shut up that much quicker. "He'll be back in a few days; this time's no different from all the other times he's gone to visit his mother."

"I know that, dammit."

"Well, what the hell is this about, then?"

Buck's voice rose with matched impatience. "It's about you not screwing up this...this thing between you so one day when Ezra leaves, he doesn't ever come back!"

Chris let his head thunk against the hard back of the seat. "Jesus H."

"Look, all I'm saying is you're not the only one with a stake here. All right? I mean, hell, if you and Sarah had split up--for some unimaginably insane reason on your side or because you were being an even bigger jackass than usual and she dumped you, whatever--then Josiah and me, we'd've missed her like blazes because we damned well loved her. She became family, our family, but--" he flung up a hand "--she wasn't kin. She wasn't _ours_, not down to her blood and bone, not the way you are. You know what I mean? She was family because she was with you, not because of herself even with us loving her so much that losing her'll never stop hurting."

Chris closed his eyes, not moving, knowing what was coming and as helpless to stop it as getting out of the path of an avalanche. After a long moment punctuated only by Mad's distant barking, Buck sighed.

"Ezra is as much ours as you are, big dog. So if you let this thing you have going with him break, we'll lose him, and I'm just telling you we don't the hell want that to happen."

Chris turned his head to look at Buck's set, stubborn, frowning profile silvered with moonlight. Buck's heart was bigger than the Rockies, but a lot easier to break, damn him.

"Whatever happens between us won't ever make him less yours, for fuck's sake. He isn't here just for me."

"No, but he won't be here at all if things blow up between you--and you know that, Chris!"

He opened his mouth, but Buck rode right on over him.

"I'm just saying, you started this thing with him, but it's not just you on the line here. We lost him for twenty years--"

He flinched, and hoped the dark hid it, but suspected Buck felt it where their arms and legs touched because Buck's voice softened.

"--and we don't wanna go through that again. So just.... Just make sure you don't let it go south, okay? You wanted it--wanted him--and you've got him, and that's fine, we're doing okay with it. But we want him, too. Just so you know."

Buck shifted, resettling his rangy body in the seat and stretching out his long legs, solid thigh still pressing warmly against Chris's. Two big men on a seat made for cuddling, a swing they'd shared and played on all their lives, through all their growing-up stages. Chris put his hand on Buck's shoulder, feeling the tension in the lean muscles, and squeezed.

The stiffness leached away under his hand after a few seconds and Buck nodded, letting out a long breath. "All right."

Chris's hand fell away as Buck got up and went to the edge of the porch. "That crazy dog must have tired herself out enough by now to hold her for the night."

Buck whistled, long and piercing, and Mad's barks increased in volume and joyfulness as she raced toward them. She bounded up onto the porch, tongue lolling from the side of her mouth, and shoved past Buck's legs into the house as he opened the screen and the door. The rapid click of her nails on the linoleum floor was followed by the sound of quick deep slurps. Buck chuckled, pausing in the doorway to look back at him.

"Coming?"

"Yeah, I'll be in in a minute."

Buck nodded and went inside, closing the door. Chris lifted his eyes to the sky and waited for them to adjust to the dark again, until he could pick out Orion high in the south-west, barely visible over the tops of the trees. The night-strider, remote but familiar as the scars on his hands.

As familiar as Buck's way of dealing with the problems Chris constantly dumped in his lap in Buck's single-minded quest to keep the family whole and healthy. Buck was only seventeen when his world had shattered, and the poor damned kid'd had only Chris and Josiah for support. Two decades later, just when things finally seemed to be turning golden for Buck with his family reunited, Chris had made it into another problem, and a freaking huge one that wouldn't ever go away. Because Buck was right: if he and Ezra stopped making this thing work, Ezra would be a cherry-red bullet disappearing down the road in his LeSabre.

He bit down on his flinch and stood up to lean against the porch railing. He knew he and Ezra were dancing in a minefield, but what he hadn't been able to figure out from the start of the damned thing was how not to set up camp in it anyway, and he didn't see that changing any time soon.

The one reassuring thing was knowing Ezra was just as crazy fucked-up as he was.

_Don't let it go south._

Well, nothing like a hearty dose of pressure to keep things lively. He smiled into the dark. Ezra would be home soon. It probably wasn't quite what Buck had intended, but he reckoned with the incentive of living under the gun, he and Ezra together would manage to find a good few interesting ways to obey their orders not to fuck it the hell up.


End file.
